Royce Medallion // D1

Medallion: Like the Jewellery or the Meat?

What's in a surname? Everything, when it's printed in gilded letters below your bedroom window. Medallion Jewellers, the shop below. Each day I'm woken by my mother testing the customer bell three times, then checking the front lock thrice, and then the bell again.

I have worked every single weekday since I was twelve, and loved every minute of it. It's rare, I think, to properly enjoy seeing customers, interacting with them, finding something they absolutely love. Marriage, memorial, occasion and gift. I've grown up anticipating all of these things, but never hoping to abandon what I do, and the mother I help each day, for any occasions of my own. It's almost impossible to get me away from the shop.

It's not that I dislike people, it's that I can spot a fake from a mile away. The way they gleam in the light, or don't, is very telling. I'm not even talking about the jewels now, people are irredeemably frustrating when I can't find a way to make them happy. Maybe, I just lack the socialisation to grasp their needs. Maybe, I shouldn't care. I can't help it, I'm a pleaser.

That brings me back to the question that every so often a customer will pose to me: Medallion, like the jewellery or the meat? I chuckle every time, but who's the faker now?

I'm stuck in a repeating cycle that I feel I've grown so accustomed to that I enjoy it. Helping my mother, who struggles to keep herself within calmness, and managing a store that I have expertise in at a young age. The technical wealth to go out and do what I wish with my life, but limited by my ambition (or lack thereof).

I'm going nowhere, but I like that. Maybe I need something, or someone, to place a springboard beneath my feet and stir within me some sense of adventure. But, would I enjoy that?

Aside from the morbid circular motion my life may lean toward, I can at least say that while I enjoy being the figurehead of my tiny family of two, I revel in the knowledge that the store will stay here for generations to come. Through my children, and theirs. They too can beam brightly at customers, fit rings and size necklaces. Trade in silver, gold and platinum like there's no tomorrow, and no Hunger Games.

But, there are Hunger Games.

It never escapes me that I live a life of privilege, and the crazies that you can find in District One that prance as though nothing bad is happening in the entire country are unfathomable. They're at the top of the picking list. The ones that aren't training for the games, but avoiding them entirely. That's technically me, but I avoid them because I disagree with them. Not just disagree, but furiously oppose them. Privately, but still. A silent advocate for rebellion is probably better than no advocate at all?

Another thing I'm not sure of.